I have heard many people talk about how French people are arrogant, as well as how French-speaking Canadians are very arrogant toward English speaking Canadians. This book at this link purports to explain why these feelings exist. http://www.amazon.com/Arrogance-French-Us-Feeling-Mutual/dp/1595230106 Review Americans-and the French-will learn a lot from this book. -- Michael Barone, Co-author, The Almanac of American Politics France sucks, but this book doesn't. -- Dennis Miller Richard Z. Chesnoff insightfully-and entertainingly-explores America's most dysfunctional relationship with America's least reliable ally. -- Clifford D. May, President, Foundation for the Defense of Democracies This book will open your eyes! -- Sean Hannity Why do the French hate America? Richard Chesnoff has figured it out and informs us with entertaining clarity. -- Bill O'Reilly Those are the reviews that come up immediately when you go to Amazon. I know some of those names will make people ask if the book is actually true or biased. I would like to know whether this book or the feelings it embodies are a true examination of French people and culture and whether it reflects true sentiments. I have heard numerous references throughout my life of the "arrogant" French. Are French people really arrogant?
actually from the way authors are attacking the French and the way they title their books...it is the English who are arrogant towards the French.
Well, draqon, who are the English? Does that mean American? English? Who are Hannity and O'Reilly? Do you know who those people are? I know who they are, and I think they're... Stupid. But are they actually saying anything that means anything? Or are they just regurgitating the standard line? Freedom Fries and all that nonsense. I'd like to know if the French people are as arrogant toward non-French people as some people have insinuated.
Actually, its ignorant to judge, categorize and generalize an entire nation like that. French people are no different from American people -- they like their way of life and they want to promote it as the best. If you were to go to France you would find most of the people to be very helpful and willing to help you learn their language. Americans, not so much. Americans have a tendency to make fun of the way foreigners talk, and also have a tendency to let those of nonnative tongue just continually fail at pronouncing certain words. As for me, I'm a junior undergraduate biology student taking French as a research skills option. I have found the culture and language to be an extreme pleasure, and I think anyone can learn French (especially if I can learn it, then relate many of the words to scientific terms). French is the ancestor language of english for crying out loud!
* * * * NOTE FROM THE LINGUISTICS MODERATOR * * * * No it's not. English is a Germanic language descended from Anglo-Saxon, the language of the Angles, Saxons and Jutes, German tribes that conquered and occupied southern Britannia after the Roman Empire collapsed. French is a Romance language, descended from Latin. However, there is a huge superstratum of French in our language because the Normans conquered and occupied "Angle-land" in 1066 and ruled it for centuries. We have a lot of words of French origin, even a few everyday words like use, very, second and question. Norman French also influenced a massive simplification of English grammar and some strange phonetic shifts. But the ancestral language of English is Anglo-Saxon, which is closely related to German, Dutch, Swedish, etc. Not French, which is closely related to Spanish, Italian, Romanian, Portuguese, etc. Of course these are all members of the Indo-European language family (along with Greek, Irish, Albanian, Russian, Hindi, Farsi, Latvian, Kurdish, Rom, etc.) and share a single common ancestor--if you want to go back about 5,000 years.
Or gullible rubber neckers Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! People are people (except Parisians in my experience Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!). Although my first ever encounter with an American did give the impression of arrogance or ignorance.
I can't claim to have met any native French, so I wouldn't know if there's a shred of truth to the oft repeated notion that the French people think unusually highly of themselves. I come across opposing views though when looking at it. From http://www.necessaryprose.com/frencharrogance.htm comes this micro-essay, which I quote only the first paragraph: Notice the phrase "their famous snobbishness toward foreigners". It seems to me that the notion of a national French superiority complex is taken as a given. But it also strikes me that it's a notion taken for granted. So I just stated the same thing twice, eh??? Well, to me it seems like one of those ideas that is spouted as fact, but when one asks why or tries to get to the source of it, the water gets muddy quickly. Here is another article about an apparent study done in France itself. I know nothing of the actual study, which appears to be a poll or survey of some kind, but I will quote the beginning of the article. From http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...INALLY-realise-rest-world-views-arrogant.html Here are a sampling of the handful of comments to that article which you can read in full at the link provided. *Not only arrogant but global parasites!!! *France should be proud of its achievements. So should the whole of Europe and America. We should all be proud of our forbears, our culture and our civilisation. The world would be a very different place without it. *Yeah maybe they are. But at least they are not spineless like the majority of my British countrymen. If the French Govt tried some of the stunts our Govt gets away with routinely the French would go out and riot and give their Govt a reality check. Good luck to them. So there's some balance there. This isn't really a big deal to me. It's just that I have heard the same thing repeated alot, and I was thinking this over for a while before I posted this question, and I was just wondering how much truth there was to it. Obviously, there's both international as well as intranational aspects to be considered. I think a distinction should be made about perceived arrogance towards foreigners and tourists, and the opposition to the Iraq war. I think Iraq has basically added fuel to the fire in the Western anti-French sentiment, mainly in the US and Britain who were the main players in the pro-war side. In that regard, I think the latter is more a political rather than simply a cultural dilemma, that was perhaps misconstrued as being a national or cultural arrogance in general. I personally don't feel that opposition to any war constitutes a validation that the particular nation or culture feels that it is above or superior to any other nation. Nonetheless, that was how the story was spun in the American "conservative" media. I remember quite well when people started referring to French fries as "freedom" fries. I was hoping to get some input from people who have either lived in France or known people who were of French citizenry or something thereabout to see whether this "common" knowledge of French arrogance is actually true, or just a myth that is propagated in an efficient and constant manner. It's basically something I've been curious about lately.
In my personal experience "the French" are very friendly: but Parisians tend not to be. When in Paris I met the stereotypical arrogance from many people - especially waiters Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! But elsewhere in the country there was a good proportion of those I spoke who were only too eager to try out their English (which was annoying because I wanted to improve my French colloquialisms), and held a dislike of Parisians! Any attempt at all (outside of Paris) to speak French tends to make you "okay in their book", but in Paris ANY French accent except that of Paris itself is disdained.
I can see how someone would guess or assume that English descended from French because of the huge influence that the Normans had on the English language after the Battle of Hastings. It seems to me (I'm not a linguistic expert), that the transition between Old English and Middle English was very sudden and some would say quite drastic. In just a few hundred years English went from being very Germanic and archaic to being something that is very much is synonymous with our modern language. Modern English seems to be more of a fusion between its Germanic roots and a strong Romanic influence by the French language. I won't state facts that I don't know, but I think up to 40% or greater of the modern English language is directly derived from Latin-based language, which would make English much more than a simple Germanic language. A little off-topic from this thread, but I can understand why someone would assume that English is would be descended from a Romance language. Is there a linguistical term that would apply to a language that originally descended from one language family, but was heavily influenced by another?
So, in your personal experience, the perceived arrogance tends to be more of a major metropolitan thing, not necessarily applying to the rest of the country. That kind of makes sense, since here in America, there seems to be a vague animosity of rural communities toward urban cityfolk. At least from what I've gathered. Though plenty of small town people are very eager to migrate to larger population densities. I'm guessing that would be prevalent in many countries: rural people in closed communities versus city people in very open and diverse communities. Or the mentality could be one city against another?
In my experience it's purely a Parisian thing: never had anything close in Nice, Lyon, Grenoble etc. Paris (according to Parisians) is the centre of all things cultural and beautiful, and they don't want you to forget it. And because they're fortunate enough to live there and you aren't... hard luck second-class person.
I love how Americans dwell over this so much. I grew up in France and its just a different way of living. French people are not arrogant, they are just no hypocrites. If they don't like you, they won't act like they do. And a waiter at a restaurant is not gonna care what you think of him because in France, you don't tip. Arrogance? America consumes more resources than all over Europe, wages unjustified wars, and write books about the French being arrogant. You are the one being arrogant.
Among expats in different countries the Israeli and French always have the worst reputation. The french have a bad reputation in China. It is usually French males which are targeted, the girls are usually very cool. And from my first-hand experience the stereotype generally fits.
Do you even begin to realize the stupidity of such a statement? Classifying an entire culture as arrogant. Now am I the only one here who finds this to be an extremely ignorant approach towards understanding a culture or what? Please, get over yourself. There are good and bad people within all cultures.
sorry. I was mainly referring to the OP. I grew up in France and I'm just annoyed by people who make such claims.
Ah okay, it was just that your post directly followed and I thought... It's a common enough perception in the UK as well, but then we do have a *cough* history with the French to consider. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
The French are not arrogant. They just think they are better than everyone else.. Oh wait.. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! That is how my French aunt describes the rudeness that is often associated with the French.
lol. and Americans don't? Everybody thinks their culture and nationality is better than everyone else. That's the untold definition of pride. People are more of the same, dude.
